Could I adjust that to say "generalist programmers should stay at least enough in touch with this stuff to know how badly they'll screw it up on their own"?

I've had _many_ heated discussions with inexperienced devs who don't understand just how much you need to know (and how much you need to know that you don't know) before you can start ignoring the simple advice "SSL for data on the move, GPG for data at rest".